Comments on: C and D line update: working out some kinks

By: dave nehls

dave nehls — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 00:09:31 +0000

definite need to coordinate,rode a packed bus to ballard to then find out a 1/4 filled D line bus was on our bumper,also looks like the ride free zone has been expanded as people just enter the middle and back doors,some things never change*****

By: Andrea

Andrea — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 22:59:27 +0000

If it’s going to be a year before the readers are activated in the downtown corridor – where it becomes extremely congested during the evening commute – would you consider re-staffing the most crowded stops with manual card readers until then? When Rapid Ride was rolled out, Metro posted employees at the Northbound 3rd and Pike stop who used hand-held readers to scan Orca cards and allow customers to enter through the back doors of the bus. Doesn’t it make sense to continue with this practice until you get the automatic readers in place? It helped to speed things up during that first week.

By: Paul cornish

Paul cornish — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 21:22:28 +0000

Metro said there would be more 18x buses to compensate for the loss of the 18 local. Were they even added and what time of day?

By: Mark

Mark — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 18:16:09 +0000

Please remember that One Bus Away is the *de facto tool for Seattle bus commuters.* You can put the blame on the OBA team, but there’s no real alternative offered by Metro. Real-time, mobile-optimized arrival info should have been a priority in launching RapidRide.

By: Celine

Celine — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 06:51:41 +0000

The buses are so overcrowded! I’d love it if there were just more 18 Express buses added – since I live on 24th Ave NW in Ballard. It seems odd that the Rapid Ride still goes through Queen Anne and the 40 takes a very long time to get to downtown.

It seems like my commute has just gotten much longer and less convenient – all while bus fares have risen. I’m very disappointed with this change.

By: Barry

Barry — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 00:33:10 +0000

Not only have things been dramatically slowed down and buses overcrowded, but there are large numbers of frustrated people entering rear doors at stops with no scanners installed or activated. They simply are trying to bypass the jam at the front entrance and access through the rear doors to try and get on overcrowded buses. This has to be greatly reducing revenue! Not to mention how frustrating it is for those who enter properly only to have the few open spots filled already.

By: JW

JW — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 23:52:20 +0000

One big issue I have noticed with the D-line is that it functionally has only 1 stop northbound in the downtown business core (at 3rd and Pike). It used to be that riders at the southend of downtown could take the 1,13,15-local, 18-local or 29 (formerly 2x) to get to Queen Anne or Belltown at afternoon rush hour. Now there are a lot fewer northbound buses serving the south end of downtown at the evening rush hour along 3rd Avenue.

What I have observed many people doing to combat this is taking any bus that comes along from the southend of downtown to 3rd and Pike and boarding the D Line there. This results in even longer lines, more crowding and often causes the D Line coaches to need to spend 5-10 minutes loading at 3rd and Pike.

Why can’t the D-line buses coming from the West Seattle offramp on Seneca St turn right onto 2nd Ave and proceed south to James, then go left onto James and left onto 3rd so they can hit stops all along 3rd Avenue? This would let more people in the southern end of the downtown financial district ride the D-line, and provide more high volume stops (along 3rd Ave in downtown) at which the coaches could be held over as part of the spacing plan?

By: Emily Thousand (@emilythousand)

Emily Thousand (@emilythousand) — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 22:51:43 +0000

Can you guys please start having actual schedules for RapidRide? You claim no schedule is needed because they arrive every 10-15 minutes but that is totally bogus and has never, ever been the case. I’ve waited as long as 30 minutes for a bus. Since you can provide schedules for all the other buses, a real schedule for the C & D lines would be appreciated. Right now we just get a flashing exclamation point and “7 minutes away” on the One Bus Away App…which we know is totally incorrect.

By: rapidride

rapidride — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 19:59:59 +0000

Metro doesn’t operate One Bus Away. We make our data available to the folks who do, and we’ve been working with them on this problem. At the end of October, they changed to new software for RapidRide service. That software isn’t working properly. We’ve provided some revised data and have asked them to revert to the previous software. We’re hoping this will be done soon, but it’s up to the One Bus Away team to actually make changes to their system.

By: Peryite

Peryite — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 22:36:44 +0000

That’s good they’re going to fix the readers and real time displays. I haven’t seen a working one of either in months. Also, the buses don’t keep to the schedules well at all, and you can wait anywhere from 5-30 minutes for a bus which makes it difficult to rely on them for work or school.